Mick McCarthy arrived at the Stadium of Light last month knowing that relegation was a racing certainty.

He will turn up for work tomorrow morning knowing that it is an inevitability which could be confirmed as early as next weekend when his side heads for Birmingham, acutely aware that anything less than victory will almost certainly prove fatal.

But the new Sunderland boss will at least be able to console himself with the fact that the passion and commitment which for so long fuelled the Wearside heroics during the heights of Peter Reid's reign are still there.

On Saturday, the Black Cats produced a performance which, if not quite vintage, was as good as they have turned in for many a month to give Champions League-chasing Chelsea the fright of their lives.

Sean Thornton's 12th-minute volley handed the home side a deserved half-time lead, and it took superb strikes from Gianfranco Zola and substitute Carlton Cole just five minutes from time to deny McCarthy his first point.

The coffin lid on Sunderland's four-year stay in the top flight is almost secure and the manager can now begin his planning for the future.

And while he acknowledges that First Division football may not suit some of the men who only two years ago were contemplating the possibility of European football, he is determined to carry on regardless.

"Players may want to leave and I want to change it around, there's no question," he said.

"That has been a benchmark, it's been very, very good.

"I think players may want to leave, may not want to play in the First Division if that's what's going to happen.

"But it doesn't matter to me who the players are at the football club. It's the performance, it's how they play in the shirts, and whether it's somebody who's here now or somebody who's going to come in and play, that's the standard that we've set for the club now.

"But we want to win then a the end of it. It's no good playing well and getting spanked."

With 18 points still to play for and a gap now of 16 to safety, pride seems the only issue at stake for Sunderland, and that is something McCarthy has in abundance.

The club equalled its 26-year-old record of nine successive league defeats at the weekend and is still five points adrift of the lowest-ever Premiership total.

"I'd like a win, I really would," McCarthy said when asked about his remaining targets for the season.

"Performances like the one we had on Saturday, I will look for every single week, and in training as well.

"I've said to them if anybody turns up with a grumpy face on Monday morning, I won't be happy because they've done themselves proud and it's not going to turn it around by being miserable about it.

"They should be proud of themselves, and that's what I would look for in a team that Mick McCarthy is coaching and managing."

Chelsea boss Claudio Ranieri was delighted to be leaving the north-east with all three points after surviving a Sunderland barrage, and paid tribute to his strikers and 19-year-old Cole, whom he recalled from a loan spell at Wolves, in particular.

"I'm a lucky manager because when you have these great players you can wait and sooner or later, they can score," he said.

"Maybe sometimes you expect Jimmy (Floyd Hasselbaink) and Gianfranco scores, when you expect Jimmy and Gianfranco to score, Gudjohnsen does and when Gudjohnsen doesn't either, Carlton Cole scores.

"This is very important for us. This season, we have scored a lot through midfielders and defenders. I think we have the second-best attack in the league, and this is important.

"Carlton needs our support. When Carlton stays with us, I see another Carlton. When I see Carlton, for example, in the reserve team, it's not Carlton Cole.

"He needs maybe our support, he needs to smell the best like Jimmy, Gianfranco and (Marcel) Desailly, and it's important that I called him back from Wolverhampton."